Time Out of Mind
by Wilusa
Summary: A direct sequel to 'Absolutely Not,' this is my idea of the first real talk between Mac and Methos after the Ahriman horror.


DISCLAIMER: Highlander and its familiar characters are the property of Davis/Panzer Productions. No copyright infringement is intended, no profit being made.

_**Note:**__ This story is a direct sequel to "Absolutely Not," and will make very little sense without a prior reading of that. It's my idea of the first real conversation between MacLeod and Methos in the wake of the Ahriman horror._

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The floor felt good.

So good that Duncan MacLeod wondered why he'd never done this before.

When he returned from Le Blues Bar he had flung himself on the mat and let the tears come, for the first time since Malaysia. Let sobs wrack his body till he was utterly spent.

Only then had he become aware of the gentle, soothing motion of the barge. The rhythmic pulse of the river beneath him, like the beating heart of a living thing. The heart, perhaps, of the mother who had once carried him in her womb...

He lay very still, willed his mind to go blank, and let himself be comforted by the steady rocking.

Floating, drifting...no cares, no pain. He lost track of time.

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But then, without his conscious volition, he found himself putting words to the rhythm of the waves. With every swell, his inner voice repeated a single phrase.

_Never ends._

_Never ends...never ends..never ends..._

He sat up abruptly, muttering an oath.

_It's true, I know that now. It never ends. I can't hide, can't escape. _

_The nightmare will never be over. Whenever I think my life is back on an even keel, some new horror sends me spinning out of control again._

_Today was the worst. As if I didn't have enough on my conscience, it turns out I __**hurt Methos!**_

Methos. Five thousand years old. An Immortal who'd seen everything, done everything, spent a millennium as Death incarnate. Even he had been so appalled by MacLeod's killing of Richie Ryan that he'd blocked the memory.

Had he been injured permanently? Try as he might, MacLeod couldn't help thinking of the ancient one as more than a man - as a priceless relic. A treasure _he_ had carelessly damaged, perhaps beyond repair.

He buried his face in his hands and moaned.

_What the hell should I do now? Call Joe? Wait for him to call me?_

_How long has it been, anyway?_

As he was about to check his watch, the point became moot.

He sensed the approach of another Immortal.

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Methos sagged against the door of his parked car, limp with relief as the Presence washed over him. He hadn't faced his fear until this moment. Fear that he might not find his son aboard the barge or even alive, after the blow he'd unwittingly dealt him.

MacLeod emerged on deck, wearing an apprehensive look. He relaxed visibly as he recognized his caller.

Methos, on the other hand, went rigid.

_He's had his hair cut._

_I hadn't seen him for a year and a half. And I was so wrapped up in my own stupid story, back in the bar, that I never noticed he'd had his hair cut!_

_Of course, he didn't sit down next to me. He was keeping his distance. I can see why. He must have been mystified at my not mentioning our last meeting._

He pulled himself together and bounded up the gangplank. Both men blurted out in unison, "Are you all right?" And then, after quickly caught breaths, "I'm so sorry!"

That brought Methos up short. "Why are _you_ apologizing to _me?_"

"I...I hurt you." MacLeod's voice was tentative, almost childlike. "What I did...at that racetrack...was so horrifying that it traumatized even you."

"_Even_ me?" Methos couldn't help finding a wisp of humor in the innocent admission that he'd been considered shockproof.

But he didn't allow his mouth to curve into a smile. "Listen to me, MacLeod," he said urgently. "I'm the one who needs to apologize. But this is a tad too public - can we go below?"

"Oh. Yes, of course."

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As he walked into the main cabin, almost at MacLeod's heels, Methos was glad Joe had prepared him for its new starkness. "If you think it looks bad now," the Watcher had said, "you should have seen it when he first got back in town. Like a monk's cell. But he does have the things of sentimental value in storage. At least he didn't sell them."

In the absence of chairs, Methos accepted a seat on a pillow. He kept his expression carefully neutral, and resisted the impulse to ask for a beer.

"You're sure you're all right?" MacLeod's brow was still creased with worry.

"I'm fine. But now you're going to keep your mouth shut and hear me out.

"You didn't 'hurt' me, MacLeod. _My weakness _made me block that memory. I let you down."

MacLeod opened his mouth, but the elder Immortal silenced him with a look. "Joe's told me the whole story. Told me how you've been beating up on yourself. You have to understand Richie's death wasn't your fault! It was Ahriman's doing, no matter how he tricked and manipulated you. Based on the things you told Joe, I doubt there was a human who ever lived who _wouldn't_ have fallen into his trap.

"And...Richie was young, yes. But he was a mature man, who'd freely chosen to risk his life in a cause worth dying for. He died a hero, not a bad way to go.

"However..." Methos took a deep breath, then forced himself to look the Highlander directly in the eye. "If any human deserves a share of the blame for what happened, I do. I'm deeply ashamed that Richie was the only friend who believed you. If even one additional person had tried to help, things might have turned out differently. Joe feels the same way - but I had a slight edge on him, in age and experience."

"You thought I was having a breakdown," MacLeod pointed out. "That wasn't unreasonable. At times I thought so myself."

Methos shook his head vehemently. "I should have known better. In the last few years, you'd coped with the deaths of Darius, Tessa Noel, and your oldest friend, Hugh Fitzcairn. You grieved, but there was never a hint of mental instability.

"More recently" - he gave a rueful sigh - "I think you may have had some illusions about _me_. I tried never to let you think of me as a 'wise elder.' But I did want to pass as a normal guy, not too different from you. A replacement, not for Darius, but for your buddy Fitz. The mess with the Horsemen pretty well shattered those illusions. And once again, you coped.

"For years, you'd been bearing up when you might - understandably - have cracked. So why would you have a breakdown when _nothing_ had happened to precipitate it?"

They sat in silence for several minutes. Then MacLeod ventured, "The alternative - a real demon - seemed impossible."

"It seemed that way to Richie, too. At first. But he kept a sufficiently open mind that when no other explanation fit the facts, he was able to accept it.

"Did you know he came to believe that the real reason Immortals exist is to produce Champions to fight Ahriman? He told Joe and me that."

MacLeod's eyes widened in surprise. "No, he never actually said it to me. Not in so many words.

"But he was young. You'd lived for five thousand years without seeing any evidence for the existence of demons. You couldn't have been expected to accept the idea as easily as he did."

"No?" Methos stretched his long legs out, trying without success to find a comfortable position. "Let me tell you a story, MacLeod. When I rode with the Horsemen, we painted our faces, like the barbarians we were. But I always wore different face paint than the others. Can you guess why?"

MacLeod pondered the question. "Were you the eldest, even among them?"

Methos gave a faint smirk. "Oh yes, I was the eldest. By far."

"Then I suppose you were all wearing the face paint of your original peoples, or the earliest you remembered -"

"No." The smirk had faded. "Or rather, _they_ were. _I_ always wore the hottest new style! The most striking makeup I'd seen among the tribes we met. Usually the fiercest...

"You see, MacLeod, I've always prided myself on being on the cutting edge.

The first to embrace new ideas, not the last."

"Of course," MacLeod murmured. "When you were with the Watchers -" He bit off the thought.

But Methos finished it. "I dragged Don Salzer, kicking and screaming, into the Computer Age. And got him killed."

After another morose pause, MacLeod said, "If you had believed me about Ahriman, you and Richie might both be dead."

Methos shrugged. "Maybe, maybe not. Maybe I would have died instead of him. I can't pretend I'd be happy about that, but at least my life wouldn't have been cut tragically short."

MacLeod seemed unwilling to meet his eyes. At last he said, "Thank you for trying to take some of the blame."

_But you aren't willing to let any of it go, are you?_

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The younger man cleared his throat. "You spoke of weakness. It was damned weak of me to ask you to take my head that night."

"MacLeod -" _How the hell am I going to explain why I wouldn't do it? Can't tell him the truth, that I'm his father, without risk of his suspecting he in turn was Richie's._

But his friend - his _son_ - wasn't waiting for an explanation. "I want you to know I wasn't trying to hand off the responsibility of fighting Ahriman! I believed he'd defeated me - that it was all over, and the world was doomed."

Methos heard himself gasp. That possibility hadn't occurred to him. "What made you realize it wasn't?"

MacLeod grimaced. "I was traveling for about three months, with no goal in mind, before I settled into that monastery in Malaysia. Walking, hitchhiking, riding the rails.

"At first I was only staying alive because I felt I deserved to suffer. Wasn't paying attention to anything beyond my own misery. But then it dawned on me that the world around me hadn't changed, wasn't any darker or more chaotic than it always had been. And I formed a theory - that was all it was - that if I didn't give up, I had till the turn of the millennium to defeat Ahriman.

"Even after I turned that corner in my mind, I saw no sign he was pursuing me. So I guessed that since the battle had begun in Paris, it could only be rejoined here."

"And you spent that time in the monastery -?"

"Trying to deal with Richie's death, find my focus again. Possibly access the previous Champion's Quickening, and learn how he'd defeated Ahriman. But I couldn't do that. Too long a time, too many other Quickenings..." He closed his eyes, and for a moment looked shockingly old.

Then the eyes snapped open, and he flashed a smile. "I figured you'd like my approach. 'Live, grow stronger, fight another day.' "

Methos gulped. "Can't believe you actually took my advice."

"Don't get too puffed up about it. I prefer you as a buddy, not in 'wise elder' mode."

Methos needed a few moments to absorb that. _I still am his "buddy," in spite of everything?_

He couldn't think of a graceful acknowledgment. At last he said, "Joe told me you decided to come back on the anniversary of Richie's death. Was that when you had your hair cut?"

Another fleeting smile. "Actually, that was when I chopped it off myself. Part of becoming a lean, mean fighting machine...which turned out not to be what was needed.

"But later, I think I kept it short as a reminder that I'm not the same man Richie knew. I feel..._marked_."

_Marked. Like Cain?_

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They lapsed into gloomy, if companionable, silence.

_At least my boner today hasn't made things worse, _Methos reflected. _Not in any permanent sense._

_But I so wish I could __**help...**_

A new thought crossed his mind, an idea that might not have occurred to the troubled younger man.

"MacLeod? I want you to realize this. From the moment Richie became the one friend in your corner, his fate was sealed.

"Ahriman wanted you to kill him, sure. Nothing could have been more devastating. But if you hadn't done it, he would have done it himself. Richie would be just as dead."

MacLeod straightened, visibly startled. Then he frowned. "You can't know that. Ahriman killed several people who were in his way, but they were all mortals. There was clearly some 'rule' that prevented his killing me, so it's possible he couldn't kill any Immortal."

Methos gave an impatient shake of his head; he was on sure ground now. "No, you were the one individual he couldn't kill. Richie would only have been safe if he'd been protected in the same way as Joe and Father Beaufort -" He broke off, suddenly hearing what he was saying.

MacLeod was staring at him. "Joe and Father Beaufort? 'Protected'? What are you talking about? I assumed Ahriman didn't kill them because he hadn't given up on getting Joe to betray me, or Robert to commit suicide."

Methos had felt the blood drain from his face. Very slowly, he said, "No. They were protected because they both wore religious symbols, at all times. A priest would certainly have a cross on him somewhere. And Joe always wears that small gold cross on a chain around his neck...

"The symbols wouldn't have to be Christian. They could be anything, as long as the wearers had some true religious feelings about them, didn't think of them solely as jewelry."

MacLeod was also ashen-faced. _"How do you know that?"_

In a tremulous voice, Methos whispered, "I'm...not sure."

After a long beat, MacLeod said, "You've always claimed you...don't remember anything clearly...before you took your first head. About five thousand years ago."

Methos's voice wasn't the only part of him that was shaking. But he forced more words out. "I can't be sure it was my first. I may have had amnesia before now.

"Even if it was the first...I tend to assume I was a fairly new Immortal, but I don't know that. The world had fewer people, travel was slow. I may not have had a challenge for a long time.

"Hell, I may _already_ have been five thousand years old! Or ten thousand."

MacLeod finally said what was in both their minds. _"You were a long-ago Champion."_

Their eyes met, and Methos sensed a hitherto unsuspected kinship between them. A bond even deeper than that of blood.

But in the end, he could think of only one thing to say.

"W-would you happen to have a beer?"

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The End


End file.
